The stakes are high. Will it add to the list of famous lovers of the late Princess of Wales on behalf a little borrowed from former President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing? The statement is tedious. To summarize: the bodyguard Barry Mannakee, Professor riding unchivalrous James Hewitt, who told in a book, Princess in Love, passion of four years, the banker Philip Dunne, David Waterhouse, David Kerr, the master of 'rugby team Will Carling, Oliver Hoare, the antiques, not forgetting the Pakistani surgeon Hasnat Khan, the last lover, Dodi al-Fayed, and even the butler Paul Burrell, who saw fit to sell its intimate memories.

Diana, Princess of Wales († 36) - did she have a secret fling with Giscard d'Estaing (83)? A novel by the former French President suggests that may have been the case.

Eighty-three-year-old former French president Valery Giscard d'Estaing has brightened the days of his long retirement by writing a romantic novel about a French leader's affair with a Welsh princess.

To be published next month, Giscard's "The Princess and the President" recounts the secret and passionate love of two characters clearly modelled closely on both himself and the late Diana, Princess of Wales.

Recast as President Jacques-Henri Lambertye and Princess Patricia of Cardiff, the pair meet at the closing dinner of a G7 summit at a time when the young British royal has been left miserable by her husband's adultery.

- I kissed her hand and she gave me a questioning look, her slate-grey eyes widening as she tilted her head gently forward - the presidential first-person narrator recounts, according to an excerpt published Monday in Le Figaro.

Valery Giscard d'Estaing and Lady Di in Versailles in 1994

According to the newspaper, Giscard's book rises above the level of a well written romantic novel because of the wealth of detail he is able to supply about the French and British characters and the palaces in which they meet.

The "Princess and the President" will be released in Paris in French on October 1As befits a member of the prestigious Academie Francaise, the president also alludes to the literary classics such as Alexandre Dumas' tales of the love between French princess Anne of Austria and the Duke of Buckingham.

But the book will most likely cause the biggest stir as the latest to cash in on theposthumous Diana publishing industry, particularly as it includes a playful hint that there might be an element of truth in the story.

According to Le Figaro, the book opens with the phrase "Promise kept" and ends with: "'You asked me for permission for you to write your story,' she told me. 'I give you it, but you must make me a promise ...'."

The "Princess and the President" will be released in Paris in French on October 1 bypublishers Fallois-Xo.

Here are some extracts from the book :

“I kissed her hand and she gave me a questioning look, her slate-grey eyes widening as she tilted her head gently forward.”

“I stood up and pushed back my chair to allow the Princess of Cardiff to sit down. She thanked me with one of those oblique looks that revealed all her charm.”